


Let's Have a Ball

by missmichellebelle



Series: Ball Pit [1]
Category: Glee RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, First Meetings, Fluff, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-02
Updated: 2013-04-02
Packaged: 2017-12-10 21:18:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/790263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmichellebelle/pseuds/missmichellebelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris has never seen anything like it before.</p><p>Well, that’s not entirely true—he was a little kid, once, and generic birthday parties and McDonalds just weren’t the same without ball pits. But it’s been a decent amount of years since he’s seen one, and he’s certainly never seen one set up on Venice Boulevard (in fact, it shouldn’t be weird, because it’s in Venice and Chris has certainly seen stranger).</p><p>“Take a seat and make a friend,” Ashley reads out loud from the banner stretched above it. “Huh.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let's Have a Ball

**Author's Note:**

> Based off [this video](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfHV4-N2LxQ).

Chris has never seen anything like it before.

Well, that’s not entirely true—he was a little kid, once, and generic birthday parties and McDonalds just weren’t the same without ball pits. But it’s been a decent amount of years since he’s seen one, and he’s certainly never seen one set up on Venice Boulevard (in fact, it shouldn’t be weird,  _because_  it’s in Venice and Chris has certainly seen stranger).

“Take a seat and make a friend,” Ashley reads out loud from the banner stretched above it. “Huh.”

“Who would do that?” Chris asks, because it’s absolutely empty right now. “Can you imagine how many people have sat in there? Or  _slept_  in there?”

“Well. This is Venice,” Ashley agrees, and both of them watch as a shirtless man covered in silver paint skates by blowing bubbles. “Or maybe everyone thinks the same thing as you, and so no one’s even touched it.”

“Didn’t they get rid of ball pits because they were like incredibly unsanitary?”

“Probably, and Chuck E. Cheese never suffered a greater loss. Seriously, when was the last time you were in a ball pit?”

“I can’t even  _remember_ , it’s been that long.”

“Shut it, baby, you’re making me feel old.”

“I wasn’t a fan of them as a kid. The other kids used to hold my head under. It was horrible.”

“Did you ever think that maybe it was all those rainbow balls in your face that influenced your love for cock?”

“Ha, ha, ha, you’re  _hilarious_. Come on, let’s go get our names written on a grain of rice or something and  _go_.”

“I came here for a snarky, generic t-shirt, thank you very much.” Ashley stands there, looking contemplative. “I think you should do it.”

“I don’t really know what I’d do with a grain of rice that says Chris.”

Ashley whacks him, and he rubs the spot in an over-exaggerated manner.

“Asshole. I meant the ball pit. I think you should do it.”

“Um, no, I don’t think so.”

“Why not? Come on, you used a public restroom like twenty minutes ago, there’s no way that thing is any dirtier.”

“I know, but—”

“And it’ll be fun. Relive your painfully recent childhood. I can look on like your doting mom.” Ashley pauses. “Can we go with really hot aunt, instead? I think I can rock that better.”

“You totally have the hot aunt vibe,” Chris agrees. “But like. I could sit in there all by myself for the rest of the day, that’s  _embarrassing_.”

“If no one comes in twenty minutes, I’ll come sit with you, and we can just play with the balls. I love playing with balls.”

“I know, you tell me pretty much daily.” Chris stares at the ball pit, and then looks back at Ashley. “If I do it, you’re buying me a churro.”

“Done deal, babe. Go whoo yourself a stranger.”

Right.  _As if_.

*

The plastic feels weird against his arms and neck. There’s an actual bench inside the pit that he can sit down on, but it still reminds him uncomfortably of drowning with the way the balls shift around him until they accommodate his shape. One is pressed rather uncomfortably between his lower back and the side of the bench-seat, and he tries to dislodge it without upsetting the rest of them (impossible).

He just doesn’t want to be the dumbass who knocks fifteen balls over the surprisingly low barriers. He can see Ashley, sitting down on a bench in the shade and sipping a soda, watching him with a grin like the fucking Cheshire cat. Chris just refrains from flipping her off—it feels wrong to flip someone off while he’s sitting in a ball pit.

It can’t have been more than a couple of minutes, but already Chris is uncomfortable. A few people walking by look at him, but none of them approach, and Chris feels on display and humiliated. He just wants the twenty minutes to pass so Ashely will come and sit with him, and then he’s going to pelt her with these stupid balls.

There’s a sudden burst of shouting, drawing Chris’s attention away from his soon-to-be ex-best friend over to a crowd of people not that far away.  _Oh god_ , some of them are _pointing_ , and Chris wonders if this ball pit is deep enough for him to sink into.

Then again, that’s a little too close to his ball pit related past, so maybe he shouldn’t do that.

Instead, Chris stares down at the rainbow of color obscuring his lap, pushing a yellow ball around with his finger and ignoring the group. Has it been twenty minutes yet?

“Dibs!” Someone yells, and the next thing Chris knows, the balls are shifting as someone basically  _dives_  into the makeshift pit. Chris shrinks away until his back is pressed too tightly to the sides of the pit, and suddenly he can’t believe he let Ashley bully him into this.

But he hadn’t thought someone would actually  _come in here with him_.

Chris shoots a look over at Ashley, who is laughing at his social agony.  _Fuck her_.

“I cannot fucking believe this,” the stranger is saying, voice loud and excited, and Chris looks over at him, arms wrapped around himself. He’s on the young side, at least, which might be worse rather than better—Chris is good with older people, sometimes. At least, old ladies seem to always like him.

He has a dark, wild mass of curls, and his eyes are dark, too, when Chris finally meets them.

“Can you? I mean, like, Venice,  _right_ , but a fucking ball pit.” He flaps his hands around in the plastic. “I thought I was going to have to punch some of my friends to get in here. But I’m pretty good at sprinting.” He grins, and Chris lifts an eyebrow because—well, because he doesn’t really understand it. Ashley nearly had to push him into this thing, and here is this guy, who literally raced for a chance to sit in it.

“So I’m Darren.” The balls shift as he raises his arm out, and Chris takes his hand hesitantly. Okay, maybe this isn’t so bad. Chris isn’t entirely socially inept.

He’s just. Not wonderful at this whole meeting-strangers-thing, either.

“Um, Chris.”

“Chris.” Darren grins wider. “So now we’re supposed to become friends, right?”

“Uh—”

“Oh, shit, these balls have writing on them.” Darren picks up a green one. “ _Weirdest place you’ve ever been naked_. Huh. Well, that’s certainly one way to break the ice.”

Darren is looking at him expectantly, and Chris stares back like a deer in headlights, because he’s supposed to answer the question. Except he doesn’t have an answer, not really. He vaguely recalls being four and swimming naked in his aunt’s pool, but that doesn’t really count, does it?

Maybe he should make something up. Maybe that would be less embarrassing.

Wait, why is he trying to impress this guy? It’s not like they’ll ever see each other again.

“I, um.” He shifts, feeling really uncomfortable, and why is it so hot out today, and why is he talking to a stranger about being naked? “My parents took me and my sister to a water park once? I changed. In, um, a bathroom stall there.” Oh god, he should have made something up. “I’m sorry, that’s. That’s  _really_  lame.”

He should just jump out of the ball pit now.

“Nah, you dig your privacy, that’s cool.” Darren shrugs, and keeps smiling. “Do I answer now?”

“I… I don’t know, there wasn’t really a set of instructions when I got in here.” Chris smiles back, hesitant and unsure.

“Then I guess we make our own rules.” Darren wiggles his eyebrows, and Chris’s smile relaxes a little bit. This really isn’t so bad. Maybe it would be, if Chris was forced to talk to someone just like him, but Darren is different. He’s loud, and friendly, and he’s already said four times as much as Chris. “Um, weirdest place I’ve been naked? Well, okay, technically I was in a car, but that car happened to be going through a McDonald’s drive-thru.”

“Oh my god.” Chris presses his fingers to his mouth. “Wha— _why?_ ”

“Because sometimes you just gotta be naked,” Darren says, very seriously, and then smiles. “Actually, it was a dare.”

“Wow, I just—what did they say?”

“I think I freaked the guy out pretty bad, actually. I thought he was gonna throw my ice cream at me.”

“You ordered ice cream?”

“It seemed appropriate.”

Chris skews his eyebrows together, at a loss for words, but just huffs out a laugh and shakes his head.

“ _Okay_.” He picks up a purple ball, spinning it in his hands. “ _Two truths and a lie_ ,” he reads out loud, and then chews his lip, glancing up at Darren. His mouth is pressed together in thought.

“So you have to guess which one is wrong, right?”

“That’s generally how you play two truths and a lie, yeah.”

“Kay.” Darren claps his hands together, rubs them back and forth a few times, and then looks at Chris with challenge glinting in his eyes. “One time, I broke my big toe getting a little too enthusiastic in a bounce house.” Darren slots his fingers together and rests his chin on the bridge he forms. “I’ve gone cliff diving, and… I really fucking love Triscuits.”

“You really love Triscuits?” Chris asks, amused, and Darren grins back at him. “Um, I guess I’ll… Say the bounce house one?”

“Nope!” Darren looks absolutely triumphant. “I think Triscuits are disgusting.”

Chris let’s out an aghast sounding laugh, shaking his head, and Darren continues to look pleased.

“Stumped ya.” Darren rocks his shoulders, and he looks like a little kid, doing that in a ball pit.

“And now it’s my turn?” Chris asks, picking up a random ball and rolling it in his hands.

“Now it’s your turn.  _If_  you think you can do it.”

Chris blinks at Darren in confusion, a frown pulling down the edges of his mouth.

“Do what? Lie to you? We just met, I don’t exactly feel a sense of moral obligation towards you.”

“ _Ouch_ ,” Darren says on a laugh, grinning at him. “You’re just ruthless, aren’t you?” Chris doesn’t think he’s ever been called  _ruthless_  before, but he knows Darren doesn’t mean it by the smile on his face. “But I meant beating me. Stumping me. One-upping me. Pulling the wool over my eyes—”

“ _Okay_ , I get it.” Chris sits back a little bit, and then tosses the ball at Darren. “Challenge accepted,” he says, as Darren catches it. The problem is, Chris doesn’t have a lot of outrageous or random facts about himself. There’s no real rule that says he couldn’t lie about all of them—he’d just said that he didn’t feel any moral obligation towards Darren. But, at the same time, that feels way too much like cheating.

He wets his bottom lip and thinks.

“I’ve never been out of California,” he starts, after a moment. “I’m in the middle of publishing a book, and… I can wield sai swords.”

“Wait, you mean like—Raphael sai swords?” Darren actually sounds super excited over the prospect, but Chris presses his lips together and doesn’t confirm or deny. “Oh, right, I have to guess the lie, right? Well… That is way too awesome to make up, so I’m gonna say that one is true. Which makes you a ninja. Bad ass.” Darren is rambling, staring past Chris’s shoulder with his eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

“The California one? You look well traveled?”

“So I look like a writer?” Chris asks, his mouth going a little dry.

“I dunno, man. What do writers look like?”

“Me,” Chris confirms, picking up another ball. “But you’re wrong. I’ve written a book, but I’m still trying to find someone to publish it.”

“That is totally cheating,” Darren guffaws, and he pushes a wave of balls in Chris’s direction. Chris lifts his arm to shield himself, laughing, and watches as some of them spill over the side and roll across the pavement.

“Good going,” he says wryly, then turns back to Darren. “But no, you did the same thing. I  _totally_  beat you.”

“Whatever. So you’ve really never been out of California? Like, seriously?”

Chris flushes up to his ears, squeezes the plastic in his hands a little hard. He’s not good with scrutiny, or judgment. It’s easy to act like things just roll off his back, but—they don’t. He takes a lot more to heart than he ever lets on.

“Um, no. No reason to leave, no where to really go, I guess—”

“We should go to Vegas! Wait, how old are you?”

“Twenty two, but—”

“We should go to Vegas!”

“…we’ve only known each other for ten minutes.” Chris laughs, shaking his head, but Darren just grins at him.

“So, that’s like a… Seven hour drive? Something like that? That’s plenty of time to get to know each other.” Darren scoots closer in the ball pit, knocks their shoulders together, and Chris isn’t sure if he’s being serious or not.

“Um…” He blinks at Darren, completely unsure, and then picks up another one of the question balls. “How about another question?”

Darren  _pouts_  at him, actually  _pouts_ , and Chris bites down on his lip. He’s not used to people who are so openly, easily friendly, and wonders what his life would have been like with more people like Darren in it.

Except that thought makes him a little sad—Chris feels like he’s been missing out on something for the last twenty years of his life.

“ _Can you tie a cherry stem with your tongue?_ ” Who writes these questions?

“Um…” Darren glances upwards. “I honestly have no idea. I might have tried before… In fact, I’m like super positive that I have, but I was probably really drunk and don’t remember how successful I was.”

“I can,” Chris says simply, and Darren’s mouth gapes open a little bit. “What?”

“You just know? Just like that?”

Chris doesn’t know how to say,  _I have a lot of time on my hands_ , without it sounding super fucking pathetic. So he just smiles a little bit and shrugs.

“Dude, you don’t have a cherry stem on you, do you? I totally need to know if I can do this now.”

“Yes, Darren, I just carry cherry stems on my person at all times,” he deadpans, and Darren pouts again. Chris isn’t sure if he’s ever met someone who pouts as much as this guy, and they haven’t known each other a half an hour.

“Okay, next question.” Darren picks up a ball. “ _Why won’t you go to Vegas with Darren?_ ”

“It does not say that!”

“No, it doesn’t, but you should answer that question, anyway. Inquiring minds want to know.” Darren props his chin on his hand, leaning towards Chris, and  _wow_ , when did he get so close? Chris scoots a bit away, feeling breathless with how invaded his personal space is. He isn’t used to it, except with a few people, and they worked their way that close.

Darren just  _goes_.

“No?” Darren asks, as Chris remains silent, and he signs in an over-exaggerated, mock-exasperated fashion. “ _Fine_. I’ll do a  _real_  one…” Darren mumbles something, digging around for another question.

“Did you just call me a spoilsport?” Chris asks, amused. But Darren clears his throat, lifting his chin as he holds up another ball.

“ _Talk about an experience that changed your life_.”

Oh. Wow. Chris hadn’t expected something so serious after those last few questions, and his face immediately crumples as he tries to think. Darren is looking at him, expectant, and so it’s obvious he thinks Chris should answer first.

“Um… Moving to LA, I guess.” He presses the same red ball between his palms. “I’m from Clovis, and things are…” He shrugs, not wanting to describe it, not knowing  _how_ to describe it without still feeling angry or upset. “I moved here right after high school, and I ended up living with like six people I didn’t know, working at this sandwich shop, going on auditions because I still thought someone could overlook my face and my voice…” It hurts, still, that no one ever could. “But… I made friends, grew up, started writing, and just sort of… Came into myself.”

He hasn’t looked up the whole time he’s been speaking, but he glances over at where Ashley is still sitting, scrolling through her phone now. He smiles, because he’s really lucky to have met her—to have met all the people he has in LA. They supported him, and taught him to feel more comfortable in his own skin. He’s still learning, and still trying to forget all the words that were thrown at him or whispered behind his back for too long.

But Chris knows that moving, as hard as it’s been, has been that catalyst change in his life.

When he does look back at Darren, his face looks deep in concentration, even though he’s still staring straight at Chris. It makes him shift around, feeling uncomfortable, like he’s being looked at under a microscope.

“Can I give you a hug?” Darren asks, after too many long seconds.

“Um. Excuse me?”

“That just… I want to give you a hug. My friends told me I should ask, before hugging strangers. Because apparently it freaks some people out. Which, lame. Hugs are fucking awesome.”

Chris hasn’t been hugged too much in his life—he isn’t even sure he really  _likes_  hugs.

“Um.” Darren is close enough that he’s already opening his arms, and Chris doesn’t really get the chance to say  _yes_  or  _no_  before Darren’s wrapped around him. It’s… Weird. Probably because of the ball pit. Sort of nice, otherwise.

“My turn?” Darren pulls back, still closer than Chris is used to being to other people, and he flicks some curls out of his eyes. “Okay, an experience that changed my life… Well, this one time I got in a ball pit—”

“Shut up.” Chris shoves at his shoulder, feeling a little amused, but more… Exposed. He wishes Darren had gone first, because if this was going to be a joke, then he would have talked about some life-changing smoothie or something.

“How do you know I’m not being serious?” Darren asks, voice even. “How do you know you aren’t going to change my life?”

“Because I  _haven’t_.”

“But you  _could_. Maybe we’ll leave this ball pit, never thinking we’ll see each other again. But in a few years, your book gets turned into a movie.” That thought alone, the _confidence_  in Darren’s voice, makes a jolt shoot up Chris’s spine. “And I come in to read for a part, because, by the way, I love to act, and sing, so you should make this movie a musical. Anyway, and you see me, and you remember me as that guy you met in a ball pit, and you cast me. Wouldn’t that be changing my life?”

“You think I’ll cast you just because we met in a ball pit?” Chris asks, forcing skepticism in his voice, because the whole picture that Darren just painted is kind of amazing.

“Pfft, I  _know_  it.” Darren nudges his shoulder against Chris’s again, his face getting close enough that Chris almost thinks there’s going to be nose-cheek contact.

“You’re kind of amazing,” Chris says, his voice full of disbelief and his eyebrows drawn low, and Darren looks pleasantly surprised.

“Aw, gee,  _shucks_.”

And Chris immediately loses that sense of awe, wanting to throw the balls at Darren’s head because he’s such an  _idiot_.

“Next question.” He reaches for another, but Darren scoops it up before he can reach it.

“ _What are your plans for the rest of the day?_ ”

“Does it really say that?” Chris asks, unconvinced.

“Are you  _doubting_  me, Chris—hey, I don’t know your last name.”

“No, you don’t.” Chris reaches for the ball. “And I don’t know yours.”

“It’s your name.”

“…come again?”

“My last name is your name.” Darren looks a little giddy saying it.

“Your name is Darren Chris? You honestly expect me to believe that?”

“Have I lied to you yet?” A beat. “Aside from when the balls told me to?”

“That sounds deranged.”

“Shut the fuck up! No, my last name is Criss. But C-R-I-S-S. Seriously. I’ll show you my driver’s license.” Darren starts to dig in his pockets. “You can see my super sexy, 15-year-old self.”

“I’ll pass.” Chris kind of doesn’t doubt that Darren is still attractive, even in a driver’s license photo. “But I believe you. That’s just… Weird.”

“You say weird, I say… Inevitable act of  _destiny_.”

“You’re kind of a dork.”

“Says the master of the sai swords.”

It keeps smacking Chris in the face, because this is a  _stranger_ —sort of. Not really anymore, but he isn’t talking to Ashley or Lea or Cory. But, for some reason, this guy is so easy to banter with.

“So are you going to tell me your last name, or what?”

“It’s Colfer.”

“Colfer, then.” Darren grins. “Are you doubting me, Chris Colfer?” And just like that, he slips back into the conversation they just strayed away from.

“A little bit, yeah.”

“I’m hurt you don’t trust me. But that’s totally what the question ball says.”

“Really? Let me see it then?” Chris holds out his hand, and then Darren suddenly chucks the ball out of the pit. They both watch as it arcs away, landing down the boardwalk and then rolling into the grass. Chris turns his head slowly to look at Darren, eyebrow raised.

“Sorry, I have random arm spasms. I’ll show you a doctor’s note next time.”

Chris starts to open his mouth to respond, but Darren cuts in with, “so are you going to answer?”

“Uh…” He laughs a little bit. “I didn’t have any major plans. I’m pretty sure my best friend wanted to buy a stupid shirt and then go to muscle beach and ogle.”

Oh, well. If Darren hadn’t known Chris is gay, he probably does now.

“Is that the kind of guy you’re into?” Darren asks, looking a little put-out but mostly interested, and completely unfazed. Chris still isn’t over how easy it is for people down here, even after almost four years, to just talk about these kinds of things. When Chris raises an eyebrow in response, Darren does a stereotypical flex.

“Oh, um. I don’t know?” Chris laughs again. “I think they’re more fun to look at than actually, you know, talk to or date.”

“Awesome,” Darren replies, with a grin, and before Chris can voice his confusion (again), Darren is cutting him off ( _again_ ). “I think my friends are going to go to Santa Monica.”

“And… You aren’t joining them?”

“Depends.” And then Darren smiles at him, differently than he’s smiled before. It almost seems a little bit… Flirty?

The red ball that Chris has been working between his hands for the last several minutes slips from his grasp, shooting past Darren and out of the pit.

“Woah.” Darren whistles, low and impressed. “Nice shot.”

“…thanks.” No, Chris was imagining it. Guys like Darren just… They don’t. “Another question?” Chris asks, because he isn’t sure how long this is supposed to last. It’s not like people are lined up, waiting their turn, but he can’t exactly keep Ashley waiting on him all day.

Because Chris realizes he could spend an entire day talking to Darren, having his comforts pushed but not exceeded, and never getting bored.

“Hit me.” Darren flexes his fingers in towards his palm in a  _gimme_  motion, and Chris picks up another ball.

“ _Describe a time you fell in love_.”

Shit.

Chris’s head reels. To his knowledge, he’s never  _been_  in love. There was a boy in middle school that he liked to look at, but never talked to. In high school, he’d been afraid to look at anyone. There are celebrities, of course, and he’s gone on dates, but _love?_  Not just an inclination, but real, story worthy, fairy tale love?

A dream. Never, ever something Chris has experienced.

“I’ve…” His tongue feels too big in his mouth. “I’ve never been in love.” It feels awful to admit, like he should feel ashamed. Even though he knows love isn’t an everyday sort of thing—love doesn’t come easy, and it doesn’t come quickly, and Chris knows that when it happens, it will be worth every second of waiting he’s had to do.

But it feels like a failure, when he’s twenty two and sitting next to someone who’s probably been in love before. Who’s probably been in love  _multiple_  times before.

Darren isn’t looking at him, but then he raises his head, biting his lip in a  _totally not distracting_  way.

“Well…” Darren pauses, and Chris thinks,  _this must be some story_. “This one time, I got in a ball pit—”

“This isn’t your first time doing this?” Chris feels a little stunned, and a little disappointed—because maybe this would have stood out in Darren’s memory as something special. Apparently it won’t.

“No. It is.” Darren holds his gaze, and waits, and Chris sucks air in too fast.

“We—”

“I know.” Darren smiles, small and intimate, and Chris is blushing without really understanding why. “We just met, but. I could.”

“You…” Oh god.  _Oh god_. “I—”

“Shit, I totally freaked you out, right? That… Wasn’t supposed to be as intense as it was.” Darren laughs, looking the most self conscious he has the entire time they’ve been talking—and he talked about going through a drive-thru  _naked_. He rakes a hand through his curls, and doesn’t meet Chris’s eyes. “I was honestly just… Trying to ask you out?”

“By… Saying you might fall in love with me?” Chris’s heart flutters in his ribcage.

“Too much?” Darren glances up at him, and he looks so fucking  _shy_  and boyish, it’s ridiculous.

“A little,” Chris says truthfully, but he’s smiling, because  _wow_.

“Damn.” Darren smiles, but he honestly looks disappointed. “I probably should have gone with something a little more normal. Like,  _hey, how about coffee?_ ” He looks like he wants to hit himself in the head.

“Maybe ice cream.”

Darren’s eyes snap to him.

“Huh?”

“I said, maybe ice cream. It’s a little hot for coffee. I also don’t really drink coffee, so there’s that.”

“You don’t drink coffee?” Darren asks, and then blinks a few times. “Wait, you’re saying yes? I basically just confessed my undying love for you, and you’re saying yes?”

“Hey, hold on a second, you never used the word  _undying_ —”

But then Darren is grabbing his arm and tugging him up, so that they’re standing.

“Too late, you already said yes.”

“Actually—”

“Hey guys!” Darren turns to where his group of friends are still standing. “Go ahead without me! I have a date!”

They start hollering and catcalling, and Chris stands there, gawking at Darren as his face heats up. He throws a look at Ashley, who is throwing him a thumbs up and an _ow-ow_  of her own.

“Do this a lot?” Chris asks, as they stumble out of the pit, knocking plastic balls everywhere as they go. Darren pauses, reaching down and picking up a blue one.

“Meet hot guys in ball pits and ask them out on dates?” Darren grins at him, and bops the ball against Chris’s nose. “This is my first time.”

“Why are you taking one of the balls?” Chris asks, wrinkling his nose, the skin of his wrist warm where Darren’s hand is gripping it. But then his hand slips downwards, and then they’re  _holding hands_ , and Chris smiles.

“Why do you think? Souvenir, Colfer.” Darren tosses it in the air, catching it without trouble. “Oh, shit. Are snow cones okay?”

Chris leans back, picking up a red ball and gripping it tight in his free hand.

“Snow cones are great.”


End file.
